Raids in Haryana to nab abductors of BJP leader’s family

Panchkula (Haryana), April 26 (IANS) The Haryana police is conducting raids at various places to nab miscreants who waylaid family members of a district chief of the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) and kept them hostage for nearly three hours here. “We have got the CCTV images of the accused from the footage of the cameras installed at the toll plaza. We have set up special police teams that are raiding various locations in Himachal Pradesh and Punjab to arrest them,” Superintendent of Police in Panchkula Amitabh Dhillon told IANS Sunday.

“We are hopeful to arrest the accused at the earliest. There is a possibility that they might belong to some professional gang but right now we cannot disclose their identity as it could hamper our investigation.”

Son of BJP’s Panchkula district chief Shamlal Sachdev, Sanjiv Sachdev, who works in an export company in Delhi, was returning to his Panchkula home in his new Mercedes Benz car on Saturday. His mother and son were also accompanying him.

“We had just crossed Karnal, when a Honda CRV car speedily overtook us and stopped in front of our car. A well-dressed young man came out of CRV and told me that the rear tyre of my car was bubbling. When I stepped out to check the tyre, the man pointed a gun at me and told me to sit in his CRV,” Sanjiv told IANS Sunday.

“There were three more young men in the CRV and two of them sat in my car. They told us that they need Rs.10 lakh (Rs. 1 million) and threatened to kill my family. They drove the cars towards our house in Sector 12 Panchkula,” he said.

On reaching the house here, when Shamlal opened the door, the miscreants gained entry into the house at gunpoint. Sanjiv’s wife and daughter were also present in the house. The accused told everyone to assemble on the ground floor and tied the hands of all family members.

In the meantime, the tenant, Veetu, ran to the terrace of the house and raised an alarm. The miscreants fired two shots at her but she escaped unhurt miraculously.

Sensing trouble, the miscreants later fled from the house and took the Mercedes car, a laptop and Rs.20,000 cash with them. Later the car was recovered by police at Baddi town in Himachal Pradesh, around 35 km from here.

The Sachdev family members are still in shock.

Sumedh, son of Sanjiv said: “It was our worst nightmare. All of them were carrying guns. They were saying that they had murdered 10 people so they had no mercy for anyone. I even tried to call the police control room number but it was continuously engaged.”